Synchronica aims to bring next-generation messaging to UK

Messaging firm Synchronica has announced plans to target European carriers with its latest platform, bringing unified messaging and social networking capabilities to phone users in the UK and other developed countries.

Synchronica has traditionally targeted developing countries with its Mobile Gateway platform, which enables push email and messaging even on low-cost basic handsets.

However, with its recent acquisition of Neustar's mobile messaging business, Synchronica said it now has next-generation messaging capabilities that it intends to integrate into Mobile Gateway, the most recent update of which was released in February.

"With this move we gained customers in Europe such as France Telecom and Telecom Italia, and many of these are now looking at IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) networks, which in this context means RCS," said Synchronica chief executive Carsten Brinkschulte.

"Before, we didn't have an RCS platform, but with Neustar we also acquired a complete and functional RCS implementation."

RCS or Rich Communication Suite, refers to an enhanced phonebook capability supporting features such as presence, around which multimedia messaging and social networking capabilities can be built.

Brinkschulte said that Synchonica is planning to merge the RCS capabilities into Mobile Gateway 6, which currently lacks full RCS capabilities, but is interoperable with it.

"With this acquisition, we feel we have the technical features that allow us to also address opportunities in Europe and other developed regions and be part of IMS deployments," he added.

Synchronica is currently submitting proposals to three operators in Europe, but none so far in the UK. However, Brinkschulte said the company was looking at this country and is in discussions with all the UK mobile carriers.

"We know operators in the UK are now looking at IMS networks, and we have received interest from a fixed-line operator who is interested in our RCS capabilities," he said.

Brinkschulte said Mobile Gateway is not going up against existing mobile email offerings such as Exchange and RIM's BlackBerry services.

"RCS is meant to build services around network address books like IM, social networking and location-based services. Most of the carriers are looking at this because they want to add value and be more than just a bit-pipe," he explained.